Podcast
Login as podcast
Password is podcast

Since it formed over 4.5 billion years ago, Earth has been hit many times by asteroids and comets whose orbits bring them into the inner solar system. These objects, collectively known as Near Earth Objects or NEOs, still pose a danger to Earth today. What can be done if one of these surveys finds an asteroid on a collision course with the Earth? Scientists and engineers are looking at ways of using a spacecraft to gently change the orbit of an asteroid. One promising approach is the "gravity tractor" invented by NASA astronauts Ed Lu and Stan Love. Hear from UH Institute for Astronomy researchers David Tholen, Robert Jedicke, Nick Kaiser, and NASA astronaut Ed Lu as they discuss the potential threat of Killer Asteroids and what we can do about them.

Asteroids: What are they?
Dr David Tholen is a planetary astronomer at the UH Institute for Astronomy and the discoverer of Apophis, an asteroid that will pass within 20,000 miles of the Earth in 2029.

Asteroids: How Dangerous are they?
Dr Robert Jedicke is an astronomer at the UH Institute for Astronomy, following an earlier career as a particle physicist. He is responsible for designing the software that will determine the orbits of any new asteroids that Pan-STARRS discovers.

Asteroids: How can we find them?
Dr Nick Kaiser is a cosmologist at the UH Institute for Astronomy. He is the director of the Pan-STARRS telescope project in Hawaii that will soon be the world's most powerful instrument for discovering moving objects such as asteroids.

Asteroids: How could we protect ourselves from them?
Dr Ed Lu used to be a solar physicist at the UH Institute for Astronomy before becoming a NASA astronaut in 1995. He spent six months aboard the International Space Station in 2003. More recently he has proposed a "gravity tractor" that could alter the orbit of a dangerous asteroid if necessary.